Starbreeze Invests $8,000,000 into Psychonauts 2

Double Fine productions, the people who brought you one great game and a bunch of games that looked good from a distance until you actually got your hands on them, are back trying to make lightning strike twice by bringing Psychonauts back. But since this is Double Fine, they decided the best way to get the funding they needed to make the game wouldn’t be from, say, the money they made from their other games, but rather to use “crowdfunding as a pre-order”, which is becoming increasingly more prevalent in today’s day of age.

But instead of going to Kickstarter, they decided to go to Fig, which is a more transparent crowdfunding site which allows for both individual and company donations, each with their own benefits and rewards.

They were able to raise four million for the game, which was all they needed, so everything is fine and good, right? Not quite. You see, Gamesindustry.biz has just revealed that Starbreeze, the folks behind Payday 2, have just donated 8 million bucks to the project.

And since this is Fig, it means that Starbreeze is basically an investor. So, Starbreeze has now earned itself a whopping 85% of the total revenue that Psychonauts 2 will make until the entire 8 million investment has been paid off. Afterwards, they’ll still get 60% of the total revenue the game makes.

Double Fine founder and guy who was way cooler ten years ago Tim Schafer had this to say:

"Starbreeze is the perfect partner for Double Fine and our backers on Psychonauts 2. Their expertise in not just developing and publishing games, but supporting them after launch will be a great benefit for players of the game."

 
This is, of course, quite upsetting for most backers, as the whole point of crowdfunding is to avoid these kinds of things, right? Well, sure, it used to be: but now that people have proven they’ll pay Double Fine for games they haven’t even made yet, why wouldn’t they take advantage of you regardless?

It’s almost like they enjoy money or something. Psychonauts 2 is coming later next year.